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Jeff Bridges takes on childhood hunger

"Obesity is just the flip side of this hunger issue"- Jeff BridgesJeff Bridges on MSNBC's "Morning Joe"Video Below

Oscar-winning actor Jeff Bridges has become "the voice" for the Share Our Strength - No Kid Hungry organization, leading the charge against childhood hunger. He joined Mika Brzezinski, Joe Scarborough, Willie Geist and Mike Barnicle on today's "Morning Joe" program with a call to action to end hunger through a public-private partnership, volunteering and other initiatives that insure funds set aside for free or reduced price meals get to the children in need.

Did you know? This also applies to parents who think their kids can "get by" with a donut for breakfast as a "treat":

Undernourished children under the age of 3 cannot learn as much, as fast or as well.

Lack of enough nutritious food impairs a child's ability to concentrate and perform well in school.

Children who don't get enough nutritious food are more
susceptible to the negative effects of skipping breakfast on their
ability to think and learn.

Hunger predisposes our children to emotional and behavioral difficulties:

Children who regularly do not get enough nutritious food
have have more behavioral, emotional and academic problems and tend to
be more aggressive and anxious.xii

Teens who regularly do not get enough to eat are more likely
to be suspended from school and have difficulty getting along with
other kids.

Mike Barnicle at the 3:30 mark asked why so many disadvantaged children are obese by eating the wrong food. Jeff Bridges responded by saying that obesity is the flip side of the hunger issue with unhealthy, fast cheap food becoming the default. Bridges also urged viewers to contribute by taking the pledge to end childhood hunger and to check out the site to get involved. A few more stats:

There are 17 million kids in food-insecure homes, representing one in four kids

20 million kids receive free or reduced lunch in school, but only 10 million receive free breakfast

The Arts in STEM learning: "I actually explained my whole theory of immunology
to an entire art class at a college
JUST through visuals and they GOT it.
I have many more problems trying to explain it to my students
through words
in my immunology classes."
-Dr. Robert Root-Bernstein

Riffing good stories

"Conventional wisdom holds that different people learn in different ways. Something is missing from that idea, however, so we offer a corollary:
Different People,
when presented with exactly the same information in exactly the same way,
will learn different things.